foilholio wrote: ↑Sun Feb 16, 2020 2:39 amWhile I agree with you, have you ridden the Psycho4? I have seen tube kites that are worse than foils and then also people can pilot a foil to be better than a tube.plummet wrote: There is no foil kite that I have seen or have ridden that's as good as a lei in those turbelent rotor, downwind, downslope in the wind shadow of a dune conditions. None!
I do this on the water all the time riding waves, it is the mainstay of surfing with a kite . A foil kite directly over head will drift back still flying never turning to the ground, some tubes will do this but can still on occasion turn to the ground. Foils even if they collapse will still float. Partial collapses can be easy to recover. A big difference between a tube and foil recovering from slack lines is a tube has instant power and a foil does not. It has benefits and negatives.plummet wrote: I quite often slack line the kite on purpose, run towards it so the lines are literally falling on the ground to get down and around a feature in. The lei will start dropping out of the sky and all you have to do is tension the top steering line before the kite hits the deck and it will snap back and you can carry on riding,
No I havent seen let alone ridden the new physco 4. No doubt it is glorious. But you can't get around physics. Soft shell kites, be it single skin, closed or open sell will all collapse to a potentially unrecoverable state in the wrong conditions.
DTL the line drifting as you describe being the mainstay or surfing is easy and does not fully slack line the kites by comparison to down slope, down wind, wind shadow, tubelent rotor conditions kite buggy riding (or i assume down slope down wind snow kiting). Many kites can drift in the waves. This easy as. Also wind on the beach in the waves is typically cleanish and coming from a similar direction even if its gusty. In the hills there are all sorts of wind angles, rotor, dead spots, wind bending around hills extra line upslop and decreased lift downlope. Its harder to a factor of 5 to 1 I reckon.
So..... something that works in the relatively easy service of dtl wave riding may fail not work as well in the dunes/mountains. That said, Wave kites generally make the best dune kites because they have been designed to drifting and stability.
Being a mean bastard I designed a buggy dune race that had all the crazy ass conditions I describe. In that race was all forms of kites from single skin to fixed bridle to race closed foils even a C quad and an arc. I raced against guys with 3 x my buggy and dune experience. They are very good dune racers and have been riding dunes since before kitesurfing was invented!.... Anyway, I lapped the entire field. Some twice in the 5 lap race. I put it down in part to the fact that the lei was superior for than nasty course to all other kites in that race.